Strategic Management: Analysis, Strategies, and Organizational Growth

This essay provides a comprehensive overview of strategic management, defining it as the continuous planning, monitoring, analysis, and assessment of resources to achieve organizational goals. It emphasizes the importance of strategic decision-making, considering potential outcomes and adapting to changes. The essay explores five types of strategies: Corporate, Business, Competitive, Functional, and Operating, highlighting the need for a clear vision, employee involvement, and ethical practices. It underscores the significance of strategic planning in guiding business direction, fostering teamwork, measuring success, and adapting to market changes. Furthermore, it discusses how strategic management aids in decision-making, identifying strengths and weaknesses, predicting market trends, and developing financial plans to manage market volatility, ultimately contributing to an organization's long-term success. The essay also references several academic sources to support its arguments.

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Strategic Management
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Strategic Management
A strategy is a plot of action calculated to attain a future desire through the achievements
of long-term goals. Thus, Strategic management is the constant planning, monitoring, analysis
and assessment of all the required resources and services for an organization to achieve the goals
and objectives set for the company to accomplish. (Reeves, Haanaes, & Sinha, 2015) In an
organization, a strategy can be defined as an initiative that managers or company C.E. O`s take
to achieve one or more of the goals set by their respective organizations. Strategy normally
involves the integration of a company`s activities through the utilization and allocation of
different resources found in the organization surroundings so as to achieve the intended goals.
(Barney, 2007). When strategizing, decision making is critical and thorough. Consideration of
the outcomes that may follow the decisions made is needed for the organization to know how to
deal with the changes (Samson & Bevington, 2012).
I believe that strategy is like a blueprint in an organization that tends to govern the day to
day activities of a company. Strategic management involves the analyzing of both internal and
external strengths and weaknesses, formulation, and execution of action plans and also the
evaluation of which type action plans have been fruitful and are causing changes when the
desired results are not being achieved. (Mintzberg, 1994) All organizations policies, missions,
and operations depend on the strategies implemented by the managers in an organization about
how to achieve them. Company leaders are able to assess their organization's current situation,
come up with strategies, means to initiate them, and scrutinize the influence of the executed
strategies. Strategy`s wide range of meaning has helped me understand that there are five types
of strategies. Namely, they are Corporate Strategy, Business Strategy, Competitive Strategy,

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Functional Strategy, and Operating Strategy (Hanson, Hitt, Ireland, & Hoskossin, 2011). All
these strategies have different meanings, roles, and are implied differently in the organization.
I came to the conclusion that some ideas must be implemented in order for strategies
placed in an organization to have a full effect. The organization's leader or owner must have a
clear vision for the company and he or she should inform the whole employee staff about it and
make sure they implement it all in their future endeavors. The organization's owner should have
his or her own personal vision about the company he or she has created. The vision should
incorporate what you want your business to bring to your life be it profit, help you grow your
community or become a successful entrepreneur (Irwin, 2018.). The owner should align his or
her vision to that of the company he or she has created to ensure that both visions help each other
flourish. One should know the business he or she has created to aid them in executing the
running of the business. The leader is able to know where the company state is at the current
moment and also what to do in order to help navigate it to a brighter future (Hamel & Prahalad
1994). It encourages employees to come up with innovative ideas and inspires teamwork
between them. This helps them improve their skills and equips the company with efficient labor
supply that helps the organization better the services and goods it offers. The company should
outline the strategies to the employees so that it maintains corporate values. Through maintaining
business ethics, the company creates a good customer relation and encourages more customers to
join the company. (Setili, 2014)
I have learned that having a strategic plan in running a business is essential as it helps
the organization flourish. The strategies tend to give the business direction by ensuring that the
entire organization is working hard towards achieving the same goals and instilling responsibility
amongst employees through encouraging teamwork. Strategic management creates a measure of

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success by giving you information about the current organization’s performance against your
desired goals and also identify the areas that require improvement for the organization to flourish
in the future. (Kaplan & Norton, 1996) Strategies enable the organization to predict and face the
changing demands that the current market possesses. Through analyzing these changes in the
market, the organization can better identify the new market trends and adapt their strategies as
required ensuring the organization does not lose its grasp on the market. (Reeves, Haanaes, &
Sinha, 2015). In our organization, the strategies have a positive input in decision making. The
organization will be able to identify the strengths and weaknesses in the business hence an
effective strategy will help us know where our efforts and resources will be best spent. These
decisions are decisive in ensuring that our business has a profitable, sustainable and a fruitful
future. (Porter, 2004)
I have come to understand that strategic management is key to the success of an
organization, especially in highly volatile market environments. The strategies help us in being
patient even when the market seems uncertain (Prahalad, & Ramaswamy, 2004). The strategy
helped to know that market volatility is a usual part of the investment cycle in the running of an
organization. Strategic management helps our organization develop a financial plan to help us
meet our long-term goals. (Ginter, Duncan, & Swayne, 2018) This happens because the plan
includes an actionable strategy to address the market volatility enabling us to set realistic goals
and correctly manage our return expectations from the goals. This aids us in knowing the
difference between strategic planning and thinking in our company. Strategic planning helps us
diversify in our investments by reducing portfolio market volatility and making us know that we
should remain invested by staying patient. Investors who tend to have a negative opinion on the
volatility of the market end up making irrational decisions which may hurt the organization's

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revenue. (Carlson, 2015) Planning helps program strategies and makes them operational, hence a
planner is chosen by the C.E.O of the company, his or her role is to design the strategic decisions
that are will symbolically influence the growth of the business. (Heesen, 2016).

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Barney, J. B. (2007). Gaining and sustaining competitive advantage. Upper Saddle River (New
Jersey): Pearson Prentice Hall.
Carlson, B. (2015). A wealth of common sense : why simplicity trumps complexity in any
investment plan. Hoboken (New Jersey): John Wiley & Sons.
Ginter, P. M., Duncan, W. J., & Swayne, L. E. (2018). Strategic management of health care
organizations. Hoboken, New Jersey: Wiley.
Hamel G. and Prahalad C. K (1994).Competing for the Future. Harvard Business School Press,
Hanson, D. Hitt, M.A., Ireland, R.D., & Hoskossin, R.E. (2011), Strategic Management:
Competitiveness & Globalisation, Asia Pacific Edition (4th Ed), CENGAGE Learning.
Heesen, B. (2016). Effective Strategy Execution : Improving Performance with Business
Intelligence. Berlin: Springer Berlin Heidelberg.
Irwin, T. (2018.). Extraordinary influence : how great leaders bring out the best in others.
Hoboken: Wiley.
Kaplan, R. S., & Norton, D. P. (1996). The Balanced Scorecard : Translating Strategy into
Action. Boston: Harvard Business Review Press.
Mintzberg, H. (1994). The Fall and Rise of Strategic Planning. Harvard Business Review, 1994
issue.
Porter, M. E. (2004). Competitive advantage : creating and sustaining superior performance.
New York ; London : Free Press.

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Prahalad, C.K., & Ramaswamy, V. (2004): The Future of Competition, Co-Creating Unique
Value with Customers, Harvard Business School Publishing.
Reeves, M., Haanaes, K., & Sinha, J. (2015). Your Strategy Needs a Strategy How to Choose and
Execute the Right Approach. Boston: Harvard Business Review Press.
Samson, D., & Bevington, T. (2012). Implementing strategic change : managing processes and
interfaces to develop a highly productive organization. London ; Philadelphia: Kogan
Page.
Setili, A. (2014). The agility advantage: how to identify and act on opportunities in a fast-
changing world. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.